Francis's Dreamland

"That's Francis's Dreamland, and also the passage from Francis to the Dreamland. To go there, you need a special ritual or spell."

"How about this: after work today, I'll teach you the entry ritual, then we can set a time, and I'll take you inside for a visit!"

As the two talked, they had already reached the entrance of the Church Hospital. Angela gritted her teeth and decided to take Arthur with her.

"Then I'll trouble you."

Ning Xiuyuan was overjoyed and thanked her sincerely. It was naturally best to have someone to guide him.

"You're welcome!"

Angela forced a smile, her expression a little unnatural.

At this moment, an unusually long queue had formed at the entrance of the Church Hospital.

However, there was a slight difference: the queue now included several women holding chickens and ducks.

At the hospital entrance, the nine-year-old little nun Eve was arrogantly holding a small white dog, showing it off with a proud expression.

"Look, this is Bai Bai, he's completely recovered! Yesterday, he was almost dead. It's all thanks to Mr. Arthur's treatment! Sister Angela said Mr. Arthur's medical skill is amazing, he's someone who will write medical books!"

Ning Xiuyuan, who had just arrived at the entrance, froze upon hearing this, so embarrassed he almost dug out a three-bedroom apartment.

"You… you told her I was going to write books?" Ning Xiuyuan looked at Angela with a wistful expression.

The reserved and introverted nature of the Zhonghua people meant they were always reluctant to boast about things not yet accomplished.

"Yeah!"

Angela didn't realize anything was wrong at all.

"Hey, hey, Arthur's here!"

"Mr. Arthur, my old hen hasn't laid eggs for three days, can you see what's going on?"

"Mr. Arthur, my old goose looks sickly, do you think it's dying?"

Several women excitedly crowded over, asking with expectant faces. The smelly livestock in their arms almost poked Ning Xiuyuan in the face.

Ning Xiuyuan was stunned.

He could still relate pig farrowing to humans and deal with it;

But why the hen wasn't laying eggs, how would he know?

What to do?

Refuse?

No, practice had already proven that veterinary medicine could also be a form of extraordinary ritual. Refusing now would be easy, but picking it up again later would come at a high cost.

But what if he accepted and couldn't cure it?

Weighing the pros and cons, Ning Xiuyuan raised his hands and gestured for them to calm down:

"Everyone, please listen to me. Thank you for your trust! I am a physician, and the medical skill I learned is mainly for treating people. I only started trying to treat livestock yesterday. I found that many medical techniques used for humans are perfectly fine for treating livestock, but this does not mean these techniques can be entirely used for livestock."

"Not to mention far-off things, just take the hen. It's oviparous, while humans are viviparous. It can lay an egg a day, and humans have one gestation a year. So, the medical skills I learned might not be able to treat it at all. However, if you trust me, you can try me."

After speaking, Ning Xiuyuan quickly took advantage of the crowd's stunned silence and entered the Church Hospital.

The tactic he just used, while seemingly a subtle way to create an excuse for his veterinary skills, was actually a blatant self-praise of his medical skills for humans.

If he couldn't treat the livestock, it wasn't his fault; he learned to treat humans.

If he could treat it? Look, he could even treat livestock, so treating humans would be a piece of cake!

In short, treating humans was his specialty, treating animals was just a side gig.

With Ning Xiuyuan's current integration with the Disease Deceiver, he wasn't afraid of ordinary illnesses.

At this moment, the patients queuing outside the hospital were pondering Ning Xiuyuan's words, their faces filled with doubt and uncertainty. Many even whispered and discussed among themselves.

Soon, it was the Church Hospital's consultation time.

The patients who queued up still proactively sought out Angela and other senior physicians; no one went to Ning Xiuyuan.

Only the woman holding the hen entered Ning Xiuyuan's consultation room.

Ning Xiuyuan sighed inwardly at this scene.

He had been a bit too optimistic, thinking a bit of smooth talking could change others' perceptions.

Thinking this, Ning Xiuyuan still diligently treated the old hen.

Of course, his so-called treatment was to seal the hidden ailments and sub-optimal conditions on the old hen.

He suspected that the old hen wasn't laying eggs due to malnutrition.

It made sense; when people were struggling to make ends meet, how much feed could a hen kept in the city get? How many insects could it find?

"This hen is noticeably light. I suspect it's not laying eggs because of malnutrition. Try feeding it more feed when you get back."

Ning Xiuyuan instructed the auntie as she left.

"Oh, okay, okay."

The auntie left, carrying the old hen with a look of doubt.

This day, Ning Xiuyuan was still the only one not treating patients, but he did treat seven or eight livestock.

The integration with the Disease Deceiver had also largely stalled.

It seemed that spreading fame was far more complicated than he had imagined.

At six o'clock in the evening, the Church Hospital closed for the day.

After dinner, Ning Xiuyuan and Angela agreed to meet in Francis's Dreamland at ten o'clock that night.

As she was leaving, Angela specifically instructed, "Once you enter the dream, stay put and don't move. Wait for me to find you."

Ning Xiuyuan nodded. "Got it."

As night fell, around nine-fifty, Ning Xiuyuan, fully prepared, lay on a couch and began chanting an obscure spell.

After finishing, he took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

The most direct way to enter Dreamland was through dreaming.

However, it was also the most dangerous method.

The essence of this method was to step into Dreamland using the mental body, one of the seven bodies, losing the nourishment of the "etheric body" and the repair capabilities of the "etheric template body," as well as the support of the other bodies.

Once the mental body was injured, it could never be repaired.

—This was the fundamental reason why the inhabitants of Dreamland, despite their immortality, feared injury.

For outsiders like Ning Xiuyuan, if the mental body died.

At best, they would lose their "dream self"; at worst, it would affect their physical body, leading to true death.

In the former case, if the "etheric template body" was active and strong enough, upon the death of the mental body, it would reconstruct the mental body based on its template memory. However, due to the influence of Dreamland, this mental body would permanently lose its dream self, would never dream, and would never be able to reach Dreamland.

In the latter case, the etheric template body would be unable to reconstruct the mental body. With the loss of one of the seven bodies, the physical body would naturally fall into death.

This was also the fundamental difference between a Dreamwalker and other transcendent beings.

Dreamwalkers could enter with their physical bodies through extraordinary power, and the advantages of this were self-evident.

Returning to the main topic.

After chanting the spell and closing his eyes, Ning Xiuyuan soon felt his consciousness blur, as if he were standing on the edge of a cliff.

Suddenly, he lost his footing.

With a jolt, he opened his eyes.

The next second, Ning Xiuyuan's scalp tingled, and he was so terrified he almost cried out.

He was still in his dormitory, but countless eyeballs were densely emerging from the ceiling and walls.

Vertical pupils, horizontal pupils, round pupils... all sorts of them, bloodshot, cold and mad.

The moment he opened his eyes, all the eyeballs stared at him in unison.

The room was also filled with legless ghosts, which, like preserved jellyfish made of human skin, drifted around the room.

This scene stimulated Ning Xiuyuan, and his left eyeball suddenly crawled out of its socket. Countless tentacles propped up the area around the eye socket, and a massive eyeball with a dark horizontal pupil ferociously scanned its surroundings.